Alabama on Sunday closed out its first SEC tournament title since 1991, with Nate Oats cutting down the final strand of one of the nets in Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena afterward.
It marked the first time since the 2006-07 academic year that the same school has won the SEC’s football championship game and men’s basketball tournament. Alabama football defeated Florida in the football version last December.
Oats was asked in his postgame interview inside the arena about Alabama becoming a “basketball school” in spite of its reputation as a basketball school.
“Look, Alabama football had a tweet out yesterday that somebody showed to me that said, ‘Championship school,’” Oats said. “So we don’t have to be a football school or a basketball school. We can just win championships. We’re a championship school.”
Oats wore a crimson patterned sport coat for Sunday’s title game in what he called during his pregame radio appearance a “modernized” ode to former Tide coach Wimp Sanderson, who led Alabama to its previous SEC tournament championship in 1991.
In his six seasons as a Division I head coach, Oats has participated in five conference tournaments -- last year’s SEC tournament was canceled after the first round -- and won four of them. At Buffalo, he won the Mid-American Conference in 2016, 2018 and 2019.
Oats draped the cut-down net around his neck before leaving the confetti-covered floor for the locker room.
“[My] voice is shot, I’m exhausted. I really just want to take a nap,” Oats said in his postgame news conference. “Go back, pack my room up. It’s a disaster because all I’ve been doing is watching video. Pack up my room, get the bus loaded, get our matchup, load up the video on my computer, watch some video on the way up to Indy.
“We’ll get some sleep and rest after the NCAA tournament is over.”
Alabama has now won seven SEC tournament championships, which remains the second-most in conference history behind Kentucky’s 31.
The Tide last won both the regular-season and conference tournament titles in 1987, when it also defeated LSU in the title game.
Mike Rodak is an Alabama beat reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @mikerodak.
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